Lifeline
by eLynda
Summary: What motivated Beckett to take Castle with her to the meet with Raglan?  Fillers and spoilers for "A Chill Goes Through Her Veins," "Deep in Death,"  "Sucker Punch," and "Knockdown."  ***Story is Complete***


Author's Note: My goal for this story was to answer why Beckett took Castle with her to listen to what Raglan had to say. I'm noticing a pattern to my stories so far: I like to condense the multi-episode arcs into a line to see how everything flows, like I'm doing with _Richard Castle, Grown-Up_ (and no, I haven't abandoned it, just doing more research for chapter two). In this story, I've also added a bit of filler for _Sucker Punch_ and _Knockdown_ and while this originally started as coming from solely Kate's perspective, I found that throwing in Rick's thoughts helped flesh out the story and give it more cohesion. Let me know what you think.

You should also know that this contains quite a few similarities to Tango Mike Charlie's _The Defining Moment _but we're coming at it from different angles and with different focuses, so hopefully it's not a total repeat for you even though we're dealing with the same episodes and come to nearly the same conclusion. A special thanks to Tango Mike Charlie for agreeing that there was room enough here for both stories.

Disclaimer: _Castle_ and its characters do not belong to me and I make no money from them. No copyright infringement is intended. I'm just enjoying some time with a few of my favorite characters. The story is mine, however, except where I'm directly quoting the episodes.

_**Lifeline**_

She remembered that day as if it were yesterday: the look on Castle's face as she pulled the trigger, the blood running through her hands as she tried to keep him alive. "Come on! Four, five, six, seven, eight… Stay with me. Come on, stay with me. No! Come on! Stay with me! One, two, three…" She had done what she had to do to keep Castle from becoming yet another victim of this man, but she wanted desperately to learn what Dick Coonan knew. Who had wanted her mother dead and why? She became aware of others around her watching the futile fight with death, one man closer than the rest. Rick placed his hand on her shoulder, offering his soundless support and trying to bring her back from the precipice. He was right, Kate knew. She brushed her hair back from her face with the back of her blood-stained hand, crying as she realized it was well and truly over: Dick Coonan wouldn't be telling her anything now. Rick helped her to her feet and guided her to a conference room, shutting the door behind them. He led her to sit down and watched as she allowed the dam to break, handing her a tissue now and then, but otherwise not invading her space. He was a silent rock, and she couldn't have made it through those minutes without him.

Kate knew he felt guilty that she'd had to shoot Coonan to save him, but she didn't realize the depth of his remorse until later. He showed up at her desk with dinner for the two of them. "I didn't know what you felt like, so I got Sushi, got some Italian, got some Thai. I even grabbed some hotdogs." She had to reassure him. "It's not your fault, you know." But Rick was devastated that the one man who could have answered all of her questions was dead, and it had been his fault. _He_ had been taken hostage, and _his_ subsequent attempt to give the upper hand back to the precinct had backfired—Kate had been forced to shot Coonan before he could take another life, _his_ life. Just like before, he had selfishly wanted to be the hero and didn't even recognize it until it was too late. It didn't matter to him at that point that Coonan would likely have killed him once he had no further need of a hostage. "I overstepped. I came down here to say that I was sorry, and that I'm through. I can't shadow you anymore. If it wasn't for me,"

She interrupted his words. "If it wasn't for you, I would've never found my mom's killer." His face showed he still wasn't convinced—he needed more. "If you tell anyone what I'm about to say, there's going to be another shooting, but I've gotten used to you pulling my pigtails. I have a hard job, Castle, and having you around makes it a little more fun."

For the first time since that afternoon, he felt like smiling, just a little. So all it took was him becoming a hostage for her to accept his presence in her life? Or was it that he had finally quit pushing himself on her, had quit altogether, to make her realize that having him around wasn't so bad, after all? "Your secret's safe with me." She heard what he did not say and knew that _all_ of her secrets were indeed safe.

What was harder to remember was why she had told him her mom's story in the first place. Maybe it started because she'd felt like she owed him something because despite his writer's inquisitiveness he had finally backed off. Their unconventional partnership had gotten off to a rocky start, to say the least: cocky and unconcerned about the consequences of delving into a place where he had no business, _he_ told _her_ why she'd become a detective as if he'd written the plot himself. But the man did have a heart and must have felt guilty about that time too, because afterward he'd shied away and only occasionally referred to her mom's case.

Or maybe it had just been a desire to demystify the whole thing and end his curiosity altogether. He still noticed and commented on things like the watch and despite his excellent instincts, he got the wrong idea from it. He thought her dad had been the victim and she had to set the record straight. Whatever her true motivation had been, after seeing and hearing a very human side of him while he spoke on the phone with his daughter, she decided to risk telling him about her mother. It wasn't like she hadn't struggled with the idea of letting him into that part of her life, but keeping it secret just didn't make sense anymore. He just listened as she told him about one of the darkest chapters of her life, voicelessly supporting and acknowledging the trust that she was showing him. Rick knew what it cost her to share that part of her story with him. He asked a few questions, but it wasn't about Nikki's back-story anymore—it was about understanding this flesh and blood woman sitting in front of him, her complexities and nuances that made her the extraordinary person she was.

But rather than end his interest in Johanna's case, he felt the need to help solve the crime and had begun digging on his own. It started in secret, but when he found new evidence, he couldn't keep it to himself; even Martha knew the right thing to do was to share what he had learned. He had selfishly wanted to protect Kate, and to protect himself knowing how angry she would be with him, but in the end he just couldn't do it. Knowing he couldn't put it off any longer, Castle went to the hospital where she was visiting Agent Sorenson and asked to speak to her. He led her into the hallway and tried to get her to sit down but she wasn't taking him seriously. So he swallowed and took a step closer to her. When he uttered the words, "it's about your mother," he saw the look in her eyes and noticed that she took a step back from him. The smile faded from her lips and she shook her head almost imperceptibly. She believed her trust had been misplaced and was determined to shut him out of her life for good. She had clearly and vehemently told him that she didn't want him to look into her mother's case. _Period._ He disregarded her wishes and did it anyway. She was _done_ with him.

He tried to use his charm and tenacity to get back into her good graces, and _had_ worn her down somewhat, but he still knew that it wasn't enough; he had tried everything he could think of to get her to forgive him and it hadn't worked. Ironically enough, it was Alexis who had enabled him to see where he'd gone wrong, so he tried one last time. "I'm sorry. What I did was wrong. I violated your trust, I opened old wounds and I did not respect your wishes. And if we're not going to see each other again, then you deserve to know: I'm very, very sorry." A sincere apology, tendered without trying to justify his actions, had at last crumpled the wall she had tried so hard to build up against him. She realized then that he _did_ get it, and had forgiven him. "Castle? See you tomorrow."

There was so much history between the two of them and this case, and that was why she couldn't leave him out of her meet with Raglan. Then too, she considered that Rick had a way of looking at things with his writer's mind that she couldn't fathom; he would be another set of ears and catch whatever she might miss. He knew almost everything that she did, and he was the only one she completely trusted to help her with this.

That wasn't the lone reason, however. If she were honest with herself, she _needed_ him with her; Kate didn't want to handle this on her own. She had almost succumbed to this case before when there was no one to pull her back. Rick had confronted her last year about her refusal to take on her mother's case again: "It's because you're afraid, isn't it? You're afraid that if you look into your mother's death that you will go back down that rabbit hole and lose yourself again. But it's different this time. We have good leads, we have _strong_ leads. And you won't have to do it alone. We can do it together." His promise to toil alongside her, while she hadn't taken him up on it before, gave her enough strength to face it again now. She was going accept his offer.

Maybe she didn't strictly _need_ him, but she was so weary of being self-sufficient, shutting others out because she was afraid of becoming dependant on someone, of not being able to fully live out her life without him by her side. She'd lived like that for so long, and here was someone offering to go with her, to help carry the load; how foolish would she have to be to throw that away with both hands? Rick had proven himself time and again, especially where her mom's case was concerned. She didn't have to walk this road by herself anymore and she determined that she wouldn't.

So she went to his apartment after hanging up the phone with Raglan. He opened the door and invited her inside. She didn't enter, though, just looked at him and weighed her words for a moment. There was no easy way to say any of it, no way to lead into this conversation, so she decided the direct approach would best suit her limited amount of time before the meet at the coffee shop. "Can we talk for a second? I got a call and," she hesitated, "and I don't want to go alone. It's about Mom. The lead detective on her case said there was something I didn't know. Will you come with me?"

He didn't ask any questions and he didn't hesitate, just grabbed his coat and walked with her to the shop. Silence reigned; he seemed to know she was focusing on what lie ahead. She appreciated that he wasn't asking for more details, but providing that wordless support she was counting on him for.

They walked into the coffee shop and right away Raglan went on the defensive. "Lady, what part of 'no cops' didn't you understand?"

"He's not a cop. He's someone I trust." Rick had been looking at her then, and he was touched by her comment; they had, in the end, come to that point where she wasn't holding back on him anymore. He knew she had let him into a place that no one else had ever been, not even her dad whom she'd had to rescue from a self-destructive pit after her mother had died, and certainly not Josh. Kate hadn't had anyone to rely on since her mother's death because she'd had to be the strong one. Rick was determined that would never be the case again—she would always have him. Whatever she needed, whenever she needed it, he'd be there. He'd never betray her trust again. She meant too much to him now and he couldn't lose her—she was the best woman he'd ever known, his lifeline to hold on to when life became too difficult. And if she was his lifeline, that meant he had to be hers when she needed one.

She tried half-heartedly to send him away when it started getting rough, multiple times really, but was relieved when he wouldn't budge from her side. She knew he had been shaken by seeing Raglan die right in front of him, and by thinking she had been hit by a bullet herself; but as difficult as the case had become, he let her know that he was in it for the duration. He brought her flowers and tried to make her laugh with comments about chocolate badges and plucky sidekicks. He gave her ideas when she needed them and noticed photos missing from a roll developed shortly before Johanna's murder; he had even offered to steal police files for her, for goodness' sake! But when she showed him her personal murder board and confirmed that Josh knew nothing about it, he understood then that he was absolutely the _only_ one she had allowed to come with her into the darkest places of her heart. He didn't take that responsibility lightly, nor would he give her protection, mental or physical, over to anyone else.

Kate realized that she didn't have to hide anymore from whatever she might or might not discover. This case would not destroy her as she'd once feared it might. Rick wouldn't let that happen; he would pull her back from the brink every time—he would be her tether to reality while she went back into the abyss that almost claimed her years ago and he would watch her back. He was also her reason to solve this and move forward. She'd found someone good to hold on to, and she wasn't going to let him slip through her fingers again.


End file.
